Salvation in the Devil's Triangle
by B.Grym
Summary: After being sent to Azkaban after his second year at Hogwarts, Harry leaves behind his old life and begins to forge a new destiny for himself at a new school with new people, new classes, and most importantly a new independance. Pairing undecided.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **If you recognize it, it isn't mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

**

* * *

**

Salvation in the Devil's Triangle

**Chapter 1: Welcome to Azkaban**

"Harry James Potter, by order of the Wizengamet you are here by found guilty of willfully endangering both students and staff of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and sentenced two months in Azkaban Prison." With those words and the bang of a gavel, the life of Harry Potter, the-boy-who-lived, ended. Or, at least that's how he would remember it in later years.

Harry hardly noticed as he was dragged out of the court room by two aurors and port keyed to the island wizarding prison. He didn't note the dank environment, nor the screeches and screams of the prison's occupants as he was pulled past. All he could think about was how betrayed he felt.

Where was Dumbledore when he needed him, where were his friends. The Weasleys he half understood, Ginny was still in a coma after the Chamber of Secrets incident, of course that's what started this whole fiasco. Because he had no one to cooberate his story Harry had ended up being the scapegoat for the entire fiasco. Apparently he didn't know any of them as well as he thought he had, maybe the wizarding world wasn't much different from life with the Dursleys after all.

The Aurors dumped him in a cell with a conspiratorial laugh and Harry heard one say to the other, "I know we were told to shove him in the lower security level, but it's much more fitting for him to be in the cell next to his parents' betrayer." With a laugh, the pair left a very confused Harry behind.

What had they been talking about Harry wondered. Of course, Harry realized, he didn't really know that much about how his parents had died, other than that Voldemort had killed them. It made sense that someone had told him where to find them; after all they must have used some kind of magic to hide, right?

Harry decided that he had other things to worry about and stopped thinking about it, though he did keep an eye out for the prisoner in the cell across from him. He could swear the man stared at him when he was coherent enough. As time went on though it seamed that the man became healthier.

After a few days, Harry got sick of wallowing in self pity and decided to do something. Of course, his options were limited as he was stuck in his cell. In the end, Harry came to the conclusion that he would work out when the dementors weren't making their rounds. Anyways, he thought, he had hit puberty earlier in the year so he should have enough hormones to actually grow some muscle on his scrawny frame.

Azkaban, he mused, was much worse than he imagined. It was certainly worse than any modern day muggle prison, much more medieval in its practices, right down to the torture. The dementors, it seemed, affected him even worse than those in the cells around him, but maybe they were just used to it. Whatever the reason, Harry's were the loudest screams of the cell block.

After a week or so the man in the cell across from him, his parent's betrayer, was healthy enough to stand and openly pear through the bars of his cell at Harry, though it seemed he didn't have the courage or strength to actually speak. Not that Harry wanted to hear the taunts he was sure were waiting to be issued from the stranger's mouth. A few days later the man began a conversation that, though neither of them knew it at the time, would start a chain of events that would change both of their lives.

"You are Harry?" The man asked his voice rasping and barely coherent.

"Yes," Harry replied, his voice harsher than he remembered due to dehydration and misuse.

"Harry Potter?" The man inquired more specifically.

"Yes," Harry answered again, wondering at the man's line of questioning.

"I'm your god-father, Sirius Black," More unexpected words could not have been uttered.

"But you betrayed my parents!" Harry nearly yelled back, infuriated that someone who was trusted enough by his parents to be named his god-father had betrayed them to Voldemort.

"I didn't betray your parents!" Before Harry could protest the man went on to explain his tragic tale. Of course, Harry had only his word to go by and no other reason to believe him, but Harry wanted to believe, wanted to believe that when his life was at its worst, that in the cold dank depths of dementor filled Azkaban he could find what he had always dreamed of: Family. So Harry believed.

The days and weeks blurred together, when the dementors weren't around Sirius would recall stories of Harry's parents and happier days while Harry continued to occupy himself by working out in his cell. Then came the day of discovery.

The day seemed like any other, Sirius was telling Harry about how the marauders had all become animagi so as to accompany Remus on the full moon and had just transformed to show him when the dementors swept by on patrol.

When the dementors had passed, Sirius changed back and started whooping for joy. Harry stood confused for nearly a half hour before Sirius finally calmed down enough to explain.

"The animagus form dulls the effects of a dementor's aura!" Harry joined the man in elation until a solemn fact entered his mind: he wasn't an animagus.

And so the days went by with a new sense of purpose, teaching Harry to become an animagus. The first step was meditation, with all his recent introspection Harry was able to make quick work of the exercises Sirius gave him and soon found himself sifting through his magic core.

A person had multiple possible animal forms, though with differing degrees of connection to each and for different reasons. One had a form for their soul, one for their mind, one for their magic, and then would accumulate them from significant like experiences. Harry for instance could tell he had a form from his encounter with Voldemort. However, though everyone had multiple possible forms, few had ever been capable of more than one form, many of those that had tried, Sirius told him, had gone insane. And so Harry spent days sifting through his core attempting to decide on his form.

Finally the day came when the pair decided Harry was ready to attempt a transformation. It was a day like any other, but both would remember it always. Harry sat in a meditative pose on the ground of his cell and began to push magic into his visualized form, and slowly but surely Harry began to feel the changes, it hurt like fuck!

For minutes Harry writhed on the floor convulsing as he changed shape and proportion, lost and gained limbs, all the while Sirius watched on empathetically. Finally the pain stopped and though sore Harry felt vibrant, like he had unlimited energy, and best of all he was flying!

It took a minute to get used to it but his form seemed natural and Harry swooped around his cell that seemed even smaller than before. But then Harry felt another presence awaken in his mind and Harry suddenly understood why people didn't take more than one form, that was his last thought before he lost coherence.

Sirius had told him that he would have to reach what he called "clarity" before his form would be much use to him, until then the animal mind would continue to take over. What he hadn't said was that the presence of his other form was present even in his human state, and it sang for freedom as if it was its entire reason for being. Harry's stay was some what more and less miserable from then on, less because his animal form gave him some protection from the dementors, more because the beast inside him added its own hatred for their dank confines to his own.

It took awhile, but Harry didn't really have anything else to do, but Harry eventually came to understand his other form and through compromise in both forms was able to achieve "Clarity".

It was nearing what Harry knew must be the end of his stay in Azkaban when the Minister of Magic himself came by on his yearly inspection. He seemed a bit miffed that the pair of them weren't quivering in their cells, especially when Sirius asked for his newspaper, but the man still seemed to find a perverse pleasure in taunting the pair.

As soon as the minister had disappeared around the bend and outside of earshot Sirius showed Harry the paper. On the cover was the Weasleys and in particular a certain rat that Sirius seemed certain was Peter, though Harry still found himself somewhat skeptical.

The next thing Harry knew, Sirius was planning their escape, and as much as Harry knew it was a bad idea he wanted freedom even more and found himself going along with it.

The two took off in the early morning, Harry flew strait through the bars of his cell and out of the prison into the island proper and for the first time saw his refection reflected off the course ocean waves. He was a long sinewy bird, vibrant electric blue and grey in color with two sets of wings and eyes. It was quite the sight and obviously magical, a rarity for animagus forms. Before getting too caught up he swooped back to meet up with Sirius, but could instantly see that something was wrong.

Dementors came swooping in from all sides to corner Sirius and Harry did the only thing he could think of, he swooped in front of them so that Sirius could escape, but even with the protection his animal form gave him the shear amount of dementors overwhelmed him and he fell to the floor, automatically shifting back to his natural form. His last sight before he blacked out to the sounds of his screaming mother was a dementor leaning over him and lifting back his hood…

Harry awoke in a room of pure white and immediately thought he had died, but then he became aware of a steady beeping and sighed, worse than death, a hospital. Suddenly, it seemed, the entire room came into view and a nurse bustled in to help him sit up, obviously alerted to his wakefulness by some kind of charm. As quickly as she had come the witch was gone and all too soon Harry had new visitors, much less welcome ones at that: Albus Dumbledore and Fudge, the minister of magic once again.

The pair was all smiles from the moment they entered the room. Dumbledore seemed to take the initiative and was the first to speak, "Harry, my boy, so glad to see you awake, you gave us quite a scare."

Harry stared back dumbfounded and sickened by the man in front of him, how dare he act like he hadn't just had him locked away for months. Not disturbed in the least by Harry's silence the headmaster went on, "The press is already having a field day: the-boy-who-lived-again, first the killing curse, now the dementor's kiss, what next?" The man gave a small laugh and the minister took the opportunity to get his two cents in.

"Anyway, you've been officially released from Azkaban a week early with the ministry's apology for letting a dementor attack you while under their care." The portly man said before grumbling, "It was bad for business anyways to lock up the-boy-who-lived," with his piece in the minister strode out of the room with the excuse of other business to attend to.

Now alone with Dumbledore, Harry had a foreboding sense that there was bad news to come, he was right.

Dumbledore took a seat on Harry's bedside and smiled down at him, eyes twinkling annoyingly. "I didn't wish for you to learn of this until you were older but it seems that recent events have conspired against us. You see Harry, the reason you were able to survive the dementors kiss wasn't because of some mystical power of yours but because the night you defeated Voldemort he left a piece of his soul behind in you, that's what gave you your famous scar." His statement caused Harry to rub his forehead reflexively, but something was wrong, he looked in the mirror only to find that his most distinguishing feature had vanished without a trace.

Dumbledore watched his actions with a small smile, but Harry could tell he had more to say and so turned back to face him. "Harry, I wish I didn't have to burden you with these things but I have come to understand that I have no other choice." And so began the long and involved conversation involving both the prophesy and horcruxes. Dumbledore left with only an "I'll see you on the first," then he was gone. The whole thing had left the taste of bile in his mouth.

Whatever Dumbledore had hoped that conversation had gained him it hadn't, it had only proven to Harry that he had to get as far away as possible from him, for whatever he was planning, it certainly wasn't in Harry's best interest. He resolved to start looking for means of alternative schooling and, perhaps, a disguise.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** If you recognise it, it isn't mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

**

* * *

**

Chapter 2: The Start of a Start

The papers continued to flaunt Harry's newest miraculous survival, but inside Saint Mungo's Hospital the news was all but forgotten, lost in the wake of a new even wilder situation. The basilisk venom that nearly killed him, and the phoenix tears that had saved him were not only still in his system but were, in fact, slowly incorporating themselves into his genetic structure and no one knew what effects that would have. Needless to say the researchers amongst the healers were quite ecstatic.

To Harry, however, all this meant for the moment was that he got to spend the majority of his days getting pocked and prodded and made to do all manner of strange and often awkward and embarrassing tests. By the end of Harry's stay with them the doctors came to very few conclusions, most importantly that the process was on going and that he could expect more changes in the future.

For now they had figured out a few things, the most obvious was that his eyes had changed, he no longer needed glasses and his once solid killing curse green irises now had red and black strands twisting within them, it was rather unnerving to see for the first time but Harry loved not needing his glasses. Other than the eyes, his blood was both poisonous and combustible. Combustible as in would light on fire at a mental command, scared the living shit out of both Harry and the researchers the first time it happened.

While all this was going on Harry spent his free time going over the literature the nurses had given him on the different magic schools. While most of the books only dealt with the three premier schools in Europe: Hogwarts, Beaubatons, and Durmstrang, there were a few that listed other schools.

If Harry's stay in Azkaban had taught him anything it was that he valued freedom above all else. In that vein he decided that he wanted the freedom to study whatever he wanted, and he couldn't do that at the large schools that were too bogged down in tradition. And so Harry turned his attention to the smaller schools. Most of the small schools were for those who couldn't afford the larger, others were specialty schools, and the select few were exactly what he was looking for: schools that were discontent with the other schools and set out to educate young minds in a more diverse course of study.

Through a long and complicated process of elimination Harry finally selected his proffered school: The Skölm Institute of Magic. Skölm taught more subjects than Harry had known existed, even those that most countries had banned the use of. Due to its location in the Bermuda triangle, and therefore international waters, they were under no country's jurisdiction (not that a few hadn't tried) and could basically do what they wanted. The lack of restrictions had allowed the school to evolve into the perfect place for self improvement, if a bit barbaric in nature.

Students were completely responsible for themselves, and therefore there were no restrictions on them. Students got the work done and passed there classes or they were kicked out. Any injury sustained had to be dealt with on your own, though the school maintained a hospital wing it was mainly for research purposes. Students were even allowed to come and go as they pleased, the real kicker for Harry though had been that they had a summer session. He would never have to return to the Dursleys again.

There were, however, two problems: he was unsure whether or nor he would be accepted for the fast approaching term, and he didn't want his fame to follow him. Past events had taught him that his identity was a burden so now he wanted a new one. A new identity that he could establish as he saw fit, that would be judged on his accomplishments not on some strange event that he couldn't even remember. And so came into his mind an idea, an idea named Alexander Grey.

Harry had struggled for a long time over the name, after all he would have to respond to it and be identified with it for the foreseeable future he wanted to love it, and he did. Step two then was to write a letter begging acceptance. He didn't know what to offer up to promote himself so he simply wrote that he'd pass any test of their choosing if it meant acceptance into their school. He sent the letter with Hedwig, who had returned not long after Harry had woken and had been his one constant companion and true friend.

On September first, Harry was released presumably to board the Hogwarts Express, but he had other plans. Harry flooed to Diagon Alley and made a bee line to Gringots. He waited his turn to go down to his vaults where he grabbed enough for tuition (should he be excepted) and then some for what he planned on as a large shopping spree, as an afterthought he figured he should grab a bit more for spending money throughout the year should he be unable to get to Gringots.

After returning to the surface, Harry made a mental list of the things he needed to do and buy and then set off for the hair dresser. He thought that his hair was too Harry Potter, but knew that it refused to change styles so he decided to add vibrant deep red highlights to his hair that he thought would match the new swirls in his eyes. The stylist agreed and in the end Harry thought he looked quite dashing. Disguise complete, at least for now, Harry introduced himself as Alex for the rest of the day, if for no other reason then to get used to it.

His next stop was the trunk store, Maurice's Trunks. The store was dingy in a way that reminded him of Olivander's, which reminded him that his wand was identifiable to his old self. Harry looked around the store for a few moments, not entirely sure what he was looking for. Just then, the oddest man he had ever laid eyes on came in from the back room. He was short and pudgy with balding white hair and wearing an apron over a robe with flowers on it. Atop his head was a hat with gadgets and gizmos pointing awkwardly all over it and to top it all off he wore a pair of goggles that made Harry think he was seeing the man's eyes through binoculars.

"Can I help you, I'm Maurice the shop owner," the eccentric man said while wobbling on his feet.

"Alex," Harry greeted, "I'm looking for a trunk with a lot of room. It's going to be in a hostile environment so any protections would be great, also if there was a way to make it easier to carry…" Harry trailed off because the man had disappeared back into the backroom. He stood around awkwardly for a moment before the strange man returned with a rather shabby looking trunk made of redwood that had four locks.

`Maurice stared proudly down at the trunk for a moment before turning back to Harry, "One of my best works. It has four compartments, all extra dimensional. The first two are simple open spaces but the third is set up with enough bookcases to hold a small library and the fourth is specially designed to hold potions and ingredients. There are the standard enlargement/shrinking charms that can be activated with a touch and a word, then the feather-light charm, the whole thing is unbreakable, and once keyed to your magical signature only you can open the compartments.

Harry was a bit amazed, "I'll take it."

"Excellent, that will be three hundred and thirty three galleons, thirty three sickles, and three knuts." Harry paid the man and left, shrunken trunk in hand, next stop Madam Malkin's.

Once at the robe shop he bought a whole new wardrobe mostly in black, though with other colors mixed in for variety. Once his purchases were safely away and his trunk reshrunk Harry left the shop to buy owl treats and food for Hedwig, then he stocked up at the apothecary, before heading for the bookstore. There he got at least one book on every subject, except divination (which he had a bad attitude toward ever since he heard the prophesy) and left slightly disappointed that the shop didn't carry books on all the different subjects taught at Skölm.

His shopping done, Harry stopped for ice cream before going to the Leaky Cauldron and renting a room for the night with only an odd glance at his age.

Harry spent most of the rest of the day studying, though a bit of time was spent glancing out the window for Hedwig's approach with the direction of his future, though he hadn't really considered what he would do if he didn't get in. Finally, near dusk Hedwig flew threw the open window and deposited a letter neatly on top of the book he had been reading on different sentient races.

The letter looked rather official, addressed in a clear black scrawl and sealed with the schools crest in blood red wax. Harry anxiously opened the letter and read:

To: Mr. Alexander Grey

Although it is unorthodox for the school to admit a student so close to the start of term, much less a third year, your letter has sparked the interest of some of the senior staff and you have been admitted pending your completion of the beginning of the year practical exam.

Enclosed is a port-key that will activate at seven o'clock in the morning of the third of September.

Sincerely,

Raymond T. McNally

Deputy Headmaster

Skölm Institute of Magic

Harry couldn't be more elated. He got in! Harry was so excited he hardly slept. He woke early the next morning to pack his things and prepare for the day, then waited patiently till exactly at seven he felt a tug behind his navel and was whisked away in a swirl of magic.


	3. Chapter 3

******Disclaimer:** If you recognise it, it isn't mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

**

* * *

**

Chapter 3: Motivation Found

Alexander Grey, just a short while ago known as Harry Potter, found himself in a most undignified position. _Dam port keys, _he cursed to himself. He was lying face first on what felt (and tasted like) sand. Looking around he found himself on the beach of a small, jungle ridden, Tropical Island. Alex knew that the Skölm Institute was located in the Bermuda Triangle so this came as no surprise, though he had rather hoped that the port key would lead directly to the school. _Oh well, _he thought, _I guess the trials start before I even really arrive._

Alex first checked that he still had all of his things and that Hedwig had made the trip safely. His things were in his trunk which was still shrunken in his pocket and seemed to be ok, Hedwig, on the other hand, looked quite disgruntled; they obviously had the same thoughts on port keys. Looking back, Alex couldn't remember a form of magical transportation, besides flying, which he had enjoyed.

Alex's first idea was to transform into his animagus form and fly around to see what he cold find, but then he saw a dragon hovering above the jungle a ways away. Examining his immediate surroundings, Alex saw a trail leading into the jungle and figured that that was the way he was supposed to take. Alex marched on warily, with Hedwig on his shoulder, watching out for anything that might become a threat. After a few minutes he came to a fork in the path, not knowing which way to go he arbitrarily went left. Bad idea.

Alex heard a quiet _twang _sound and threw himself to the ground just in time to see an arrow fly by where he had just been standing. _Right it is then. _He continued down the path, whenever he reached another fork he would enlarge a pebble and roll it to see if it set of any traps, and so he made slow progress, but at least he didn't have an arrow sticking through him or was stuck at the bottom of a hole with a javelin run through him. At least now he knew part of the reason why the school had such a reputation for being so dangerous, they certainly didn't shy away from killing the students. On second thought, he realized that his time at Hogwarts hadn't been much safer.

Alex estimated he had been walking for a little over a half hour when he came to a shallow stream. _Seems safe enough, _he thought. Wrong again! Everything seemed ok while he was crossing, but when he emerged on the other side he saw that his legs were covered in little black creatures that he assumed was some kind of leech, probably a magical variety.

Alex freaked out for a second before a slightly sadistic smile crossed his face. Either the poison in his blood hadn't set in, or the critters were immune to it, good thing that wasn't the only property his blood had. With a thought, all the leeches spontaneously combusted and Alex was on his way again.

_This isn't so hard, _Alex thought, but kept his guard up just in case. After another hour or so of walking he finally emerged from the jungle to find himself on a beech much like the one he had started on. He was just about to start looking for another clue as to where he was supposed to go when something started to emerge from the water.

Once it had cleared the surface, Alex instantly recognized it as a troll and dove left as it attempted to hit him with its gigantic, spiked, club. Alex continued to dodge for a minute, waiting for an opening. When the creature stumbled slightly as it overbalanced with its club Alex tried the old levitation trick, however this troll seemed to have a harder head than the last one Alex had met and was only dazed for a second before it picked up its club and restarted its onslaught of attacks.

Just as Alex was about to try another attack, he slipped into the water and looked up to see the trolls weapon traveling toward his prone figure. Just then, Hedwig flew into the monstrosity's face, effectively distracting it in the nick of time, unfortunately, the loyal bird got a spike in the gut for her trouble.

Alex yelled out in anguish for loosing his familiar and let loose that first spell that came to mind. Later he would be unable to recall why, but the spell was a tickling hex and as it hit its mark the beast paused mid swing opened its mouth and laughed. It laughed and Alex had an idea.

Trolls were naturally spell resistant to most magics, but Alex was willing to bet that his mouth was vulnerable. He let loose another tickling hex quickly followed by a curse that caused pus filled boils, his aim was true and the troll fell over choking on pus before it died.

Alex quickly ran to Hedwig's body and cradled it fondly, all the while sobbing. In that moment of anguish he remembered a very important fact: he was a wizard. He was a wizard and the school he was about to enter taught necromancy. Alex hadn't known what he had wanted to study up until that moment, but now he was sure. Alexander Grey would master necromancy and bring Hedwig back from the grave.

In the meantime, Alex put the only preservation charm he knew on Hedwig's body and placed it carefully in the empty compartment in his trunk. Once he had reshrunk his trunk and put it away once again Alex surveyed his surrounding.

The beech he was on was almost identical to the one he had started on, and the only trail was the one he had come from. _Well, _he mused, _the troll came from the water. _Without any other ideas, Alex dived into the warm waters and looked around. At first he saw nothing, but then he saw lights below him. The school was underwater. He took a deep breath before swimming as quickly as he could towards the lights.

The complex before him was larger than he had thought it would be and was laid out in a cross pattern. Alex swam towards the large, translucent dome in the center and hoped that he would make it before he ran out of air. As he swam a thought entered his mind: _next time I'll take the dragon._

Alex reached the dome with an ache in his lungs and slipped though the barrier, only to find himself falling through open air. Alex smacked harshly against hard black marble floor. He had been falling on his face much too often that day. Alex embarrassingly picked himself up and brushed himself off, satisfied that he was only bruised.

"A most undignified entrance, Mr. Grey," Alex heard a voice behind him say.

Alex looked around for the first time and found himself in a large, round, domed room made primarily of swirling white and black marble with four corridors leading off it at right angles. In the center of the room was the largest tree he had ever seen that was also an unsettling blood red in color. The room was filled with people milling about; some had stopped to look at him disparagingly before moving on their way.

Alex turned to the person who had spoken; it was a tall man with long black hair, dark eyes, and aristocratic features. The man wore black robes, had very pail skin, and reminded him a bit of Snape (little did he know that the man before him was actually a vampire).

"Sorry about that, sir," Alex replied back dumbly.

"Anyway, I am Professor McNally, the deputy headmaster, the senior staff has already scored your trial," the man began, "For the instinct and reflexes portion you scored above average, in caution and observation you remain unscored as we were unable to tell how you dealt with those leeches, however we would have preferred if you had avoided it all together. We thought your eventual strategy in the battle portion was quite inventive and all together have decided that you merit admission to the school."

Alex was so ecstatic at the news that he almost missed the rest of what the professor had to say. "Here is a map, your room is in the south wing, 442 C. After you have your things settled report to gym B for testing," With that the man turned and began walking toward the north corridor before turning slightly and adding, "And Mr. Grey… sorry about your familiar," with that the man was gone and so were any lingering thoughts in Alex's head comparing him to Snape.

Alex quickly made his way down the south corridor, following his map to the fourth floor to where his room was located. The room was very plain. Rectangular in shape, the room had plain white walls, and a bed and desk to the right of the door. The room was lit by some form of glowing algae that grew across the ceiling and at the end of the room was a sliding glass door that led out onto a balcony that was covered in the same, translucent, bubble-like barrier that he had passed through to get into the school. Stepping back into the room he also noticed that there was a bathroom and a closet through doors on the left of the room.

Alex took his trunk out of his pocket, enlarged it, and placed it in the closet, before heading back out of the room to report to gym B, hoping that the simple locking charm that he placed on the door was enough of a deterrent, at least for now.

When Alex arrived at the gym, he noticed that there were several students already there. Alex spent the remainder of the day proving to the examiner his prior magical knowledge and barely qualified for level three classes. It seemed that Skölm allowed you to take any class that you could prove competency for; on the flip side it also meant that Alex had to qualify for every class he wanted to take unless he had already completed the prerequisites.

Alex finished off his time in the gym by signing up for classes. It seemed that before he could start on Necromancy Alex had to take Blood magic, which meant he also had to take runes and arithmacy. All in all, he ended up with: Blood magic, non-magical defense, charms, magical theory (the school's one required class, which was oddly only taught on the full moon), arithmacy, runes, transfiguration, and magical creatures. The examiner told him that that was an average load of classes so he figured he'd do fine, but if his test results were any indication he was already behind.

Alex had to rush to the dinning hall in the north wing to get there before dinner started. The room was larger than the entrance hall and the far wall was one of the strange translucent barriers. The room was filled with many small round tables, and there seemed to be some kind of silent division between the tables. Because of this, Alex was unsure of where to sit, before deciding on an empty table near the center.

There was no beginning of the year speech by the headmistress; indeed there was nothing about the meal to indicate that it was the start of term. Alex was confused at first on how to actually get food, but quickly figured out that there was a menu in front of him, and that the rapidly declining numbers to the right of the dishes were how many were left. Alex quickly ordered pork chops, mashed potatoes, and some pumpkin juice. Alex wondered if there was competition to get what you wanted to eat then what the academic competition must be like. He also took note of some rather odd things on the menu, like blood, before remembering that a lot of other species attended the school besides plain humans.

After dinner, Alex followed his map to the library where he first looked up a better way to preserve Hedwig's body before setting in for some of his normal studies. He didn't want to be behind, but classes started the next day and he knew that he already was.


	4. Chapter 4

******Disclaimer:** If you recognise it, it isn't mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

**

* * *

**

Chapter 4: Deficiencies and Desolation

Alexander Grey started his time at the Skölm Institute of Magic with a tenacity that would have made his old friend Hermione proud. In fact, Alex's first year at Skölm was so far looking a lot like Hermione's first year at Hogwarts, what with the lack of friends and all his time being spent in the library studying. The difference, however, was that though he had established himself as a bookworm he was behind most of the other students in most of his subjects.

His time at Hogwarts had left Alex ill prepared for the environment he encountered at his new school. He struggled along in charms and transfiguration, and non-magical defense was kicking his ass. He found himself reviewing muggle mathematics to help with arithmacy, and though the class was as new to the other students as it was to him everyone else seemed to be a lot more knowledgeable in magical creatures. Runes and blood magic, however, he seemed to be on the same level as the rest of the students. Blood magic, in fact was quickly becoming his favorite class

Originally, he had just been taking blood magic as a prerequisite for necromancy, but the subject fascinated him like few others. Blood magic was a particularly specialized field, dealing almost exclusively with self enhancement rituals but had sub uses in some enchantments and wards that had to do with tying the desired effect to the user. However, blood magic was terribly dangerous, the slightest mistake could result in death, particularly with the rituals, but Alex had taken to it like a fish to water.

Though most blood magic was used in rituals, the first term of the class dealt exclusively with charms and enchantments, as these were far less dangerous and allowed the students to get a feel for it without risking their lives, though there was still some risk.

The blood magic professor, Oskar Nydel, was a Yuan-ti, which was a kind of snake-human hybrid, and Alex had had a hard time the first few days in class having to stop himself from speaking parceltongue, though he thought that it had, had a positive affect on his relationship with the professor, who was very interested with Alex's ability to talk to snakes. To tell the truth, Alex was surprised he still had the ability; he had thought he had lost it along with the piece of Voldemort's soul and his scar. Then again he might have lost it, but the basilisk venom working its way into his genetics had given it back, he probably wouldn't ever find out.

Alex was actually a little ahead of the rest of his blood magic class and Professor Nydel had him designing his first piece of blood magic, a locking enchantment. Blood magic, unlike wand magic, was a very personal art. The same set of runes may work for one person but bow up in the face of another, not to say that there weren't rules or commonalities, but it certainly wasn't point and shoot. Alex, however, seemed to instinctively know to incorporate many of the nuances that the other students would take weeks to learn, like the angle at which to cut the runes, the amount of blood to be used, or the placement and pattern of the runes.

In order to work at the advanced pace in blood magic, however, Alex also had to study ahead in arithmacy and runes while still finding time for his regular studies. He knew that all his extra studying would pay off though, even if it did make him feel like Hermione. Hopefully it wouldn't take another troll to make some friends though; of course thinking of trolls brought his mind back to Hedwig and, with a determined gleam in his eye, back to studying.

Alex's second favorite class was, arguably, non-magical defense, even if he wasn't doing very well in it. He was in the beginner class, but even though most of the other students were his age almost all of them were doing better than he was. Some of this might have had something to do with the fact that they weren't human. Anyway, the class was learning the basics of a few different martial arts, to see which type the individual students preferred. Alex hadn't found his style yet, but was enjoying himself immensely. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right?

Back to the subject of the different species that inhabited the school, it seemed that that was the strange division that Alex had felt the first day in the dining hall. Most, especially the more exotic races, seemed to socialize exclusively with others of their race. Alex was also surprised to find that normal humans were a severe minority at the school, though he wasn't sure, what with his changing genetics, if he fit in that category either.

Some of the different species seemed to get along better than others, the vampires and veela for instance seemed to have some kind of agreement. On the other hand, there were the elves and were-animals that were constantly at each others throats, in the first week alone Alex must have witnessed a dozen scuffles. Goblins didn't really seem to like anyone, and most races seemed to find normal humans inferior, not that he entirely disagreed, almost all of the other species in the school had some large advantage over them.

There also seemed to be some kind of strange connection between the students. Alex would walk down the halls and swear that whenever someone passed anyone else there was a moment of tension as if there might be a fight, and then it was gone. Maybe it was a minor form of telepathy; he'd have to look that up.

Currently, it was the Saturday after the first week of school, and Alex had been called to the Headmistress's office in the fifth floor of the north wing. Alex knocked, and after receiving the affirmative to enter, he walked in and noticed that it was rather sparse, but had a homey feel about it. The desk and chairs were mahogany and were excellently crafted, and looked as though each piece was made of only a single piece of wood instead of fitted together by several. The floor was a dark hardwood and the rock walls were covered here and there by a painting or tapestry, mainly of wooded scenes. The headmistress herself sat behind her desk going over one of the numerous papers that littered her desk.

It was obvious that Adryana Gälanodel, the headmistress, would have been particularly tall if she had not been sitting. She had long chestnut hair that fell all the way down her back and ice blue, calculating eyes. Her skin was a light brownish color that reminded Alex of bark and her pointed ears clearly gave away the fact that she was an elf. She wore a dark, cloak-like, jacket over a green blouse and skirt none of which seemed to be capable of hindering her in the slightest.

The woman indicated for Alex to sit and he did as she began to speak. "Thank you for coming, Mr. Grey. I like to meet with all the new students after there first week here, just to see how well they're settling in and to determine how well I believe you will do during your stay here at Skölm." Alex nodded and she continued, "We were very surprised to receive your application, especially so close to the start of term, but we will determine if you are fit enough to succeed here in time.

Your beginning of the year trials and placement tests weren't anything special, though somewhat better than we expect from a student transferring from a European school. All of your teachers seem to think that you are doing adequately in their classes, in fact Professor Nydel tells me you're the most talented student in his class." Alex had the decency to blush.

Overall, the headmistress's assessment was correct, if a bit brutal, and she wasn't finished yet, "As you should well know, this school has strict non interference policies regarding its students, however, we are an elite school and expect our students to excel, and adequacy will not allow you to graduate."

Her last statement cut Alex a bit deeper than he was willing to admit and he felt compelled to interject, "With all do respect, headmistress, but it is not my intension to skate by, if I had wanted to do that I would have never have applied to such a school as this. Further more, I believe that you and the other professor will see that I will begin to perform much better that 'adequate' as soon as I have caught up to my peers in the subjects for which I have been ill prepared by little fault of my own."

The headmistress eyed him intently for a moment with her slightly angled eyes before smiling slightly, "See that you do," with that she turned back to her papers and Alex took the gesture for the dismissal that it was.

Alex returned to the library in the east wing and promptly threw himself back into his studies with such vigor and tenacity that he didn't even notice when he missed the evening meal. When he began to feel fatigued he dragged himself back to his room only to be greeted by the most devastating sight since Hedwig's death.

His room had been completely torn apart, the sliding glass door was shattered, the desk and bed lay in pieces laying about the room and most of the floorboards had been pulled up. Worst of all, however, was that when he looked in the closet he found his trunk gone.

His trunk that contained almost the entirety of his worldly possessions was gone. Hedwig's body was gone. Alex was more furious than he had ever been in his entire life combined, and yet he was entirely powerless to do anything. He knew that none of the staff would aid him and he had no friends to turn to, so he did the only thing he could, he wept. He wept and wept until he had no more tears and then set to work putting his room back in working order.

One thing was certain, whoever had done this would regret the day they were born if Alex ever caught up with them.


	5. Chapter 5

******Disclaimer:** If you recognise it, it isn't mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

**

* * *

**

Salvation in the Devil's Triangle

**Chapter 5: Recognition of Inadequacy**

It was nearly a month since Alex's things, including Hedwig's body had been stolen. Alex, after recovering from the loss, had delved into his studies harder even then before and had finally caught up to the rest of his class, this had allowed him a significant amount of time in which he could study other things or work out and practice his martial arts that he was being taught.

Alex had spent some time researching locater spells, but none of them had turned up any results and Alex was sure he'd done them correctly. His things had obviously been well hidden. His only hope now was that he would meet someone that knew who had taken his things and would be willing to part with the information, of course, at this point Alex wasn't beyond forcing the issue.

His classes, for the most part, were going well, especially blood magic. Alex had finished his locking array and a security array that would deliver a nasty shock to anyone else that touched the enchanted object, besides himself, and was now working on a piece that l made the enchanted object look like something else to everyone else. Professor Nydel had been very surprised by his progress and was talking about moving him up a level the next semester, which would mean that he would be able to begin necromancy that much sooner.

Alex's quick advancement had caused him to have too study increasingly far ahead in both runes and arithmacy, Professor McNally, the teacher for both classes and also the deputy headmaster, had noticed and had also approached him about skipping a level the next term. Of course, his other classes weren't going nearly as well.

He did well, especially in the practical side, of both charms and transfiguration, but he certainly wasn't anywhere near the top of the class, and defense was even worse. Alex was convinced that if he didn't start doing dramatically better soon the teacher, Ulfgar Veit (a were-polar bear), was going to make him repeat the class. In any case the class taught skills that Alex desperately needed if he was going to survive at this school.

Then there was the schools one required course: magical theory. Alex finally learned why the class was only taught on the full moon, the teacher, Professor Hoot, was a were-human. That is to say that on any other day but the full moon he was an owl. The man was amazingly intelligent and his very presence caused the students caused the students question the limits of magic. Alex himself found himself wondering if there were limits beyond one's own. He'd only had one class with the man so far, but Alex thought that he'd probably learned more about magic than the entire some of his experience previous.

As most days would find him, Alex was studying in the library, very glad of the strict no violence zones. As he spent most of his time in the library unless he was eating, Alex found that he had been able to avoid getting into any fights as both the library and dinning hall were violence-free zones. On this particular day, however, Alex found some of his old habits kicking in; some would call it his "saving people thing".

Alex was sitting calmly in the library somewhat close to the entrance studying up on some particular runes he was thinking of using for his next blood magic piece when he heard raised voices coming from the corridor. From what it sounded like two of the male students had cornered a female student and were bulling her, something about how worthless her clan had been and how she should just bow to them and do their bidding. Something about growing up at the Dursleys had left Alex with the unexplainable need to help other people in need, even if they didn't think they needed it. Gryffindor courage and recklessness kicking in he quickly packed his things and strode out into the hallway to see that the two males had forced the girl against a wall and were baring fangs at her while she glared back defiantly. Vampires then, great.

One of the boys was taller than the other with darker features, and both were clearly older than Alex or the girl who looked to be the same age. Alex strode over to the group, not thinking that the vampires were naturally stronger and faster than him nor that their knowledge of magic was probably greater than his own.

"Oi, what do you think you're doing?" Alex yelled, taking their attention from the girl who slid out from under their grip and stepped away from them, but stayed to watch the confrontation.

"None of your business mortal, now step back before you get yourself killed," the taller replied.

"And watch as you terrorize some girl, I don't think so." By now a crowd was starting to form and Alex realized for the first time that he had just challenged two vampires. Oh shit!

"Fine, have it your way then," And with that the two sprung at Alex so fast that his eyes didn't even see the blows coming.

Alex didn't stand a chance; he didn't get a single blow in the entire fight while the two weren't pulling any punches. Minutes later found him in much the same position as the girl had been in before, except that the two vamps were attached to the sides of his neck, sucking his blood, as the crowd watched on. The vampires, however, were about to find out why it is a very bad idea to suck the blood of one Alexander Grey, his blood was poisonous, even to vampires.

The crowd gasped as the two vampires that had, as far as they knew, already won the fight fall to the ground, dead. The wounds on Alex's neck quickly healed and he decided that a bit of a demonstration was in order, if just to insure that he wasn't attacked by anyone else anytime soon. Alex mentally ignited his blood that was left in the vampires bodies and the remains were quickly reduced to ash.

The crowd quickly dispersed leaving Alex alone with the girl from before.

"What was that?" the girl asked.

"Let's just say that my blood is hazardous," Alex replied, not really wanting to explain, or trusting the girl enough to say.

"Well that's obvious," the girl stated, "Anyway, I'm Claire, Claire Anippe, and you're Alexander Grey, the new third year right?"

"How did you know?

"We have transfiguration and non-magical defense together," Now that Alex thought about it he did remember her, she was at the top of their class in defense and it was clear that she had, had prior training; she'd probably skip a few levels while Alex repeated them.

"Right, I remember now."

"Anyway, I suppose you want some kind of reward for your show of heroics?"

Alex thought it was a bit cliché, but couldn't hold himself, "No thanks necessary miss."

Claire laughed, clearly amused, "Well not that I couldn't have gotten out of the situation myself, I do feel some form of debt to you for removing the nuisance of those thugs. You had your things stolen a while ago, right?"

Alex, beyond asking where she got her information, was relieved that he'd found someone who knew what happened. "Yes."

"They were taken by another third year, a were-bear, by the name of Blake Jenkins." Alex remembered the boy from his blood magic class.

"Thanks," Her part done, the girl walked away satisfied that she had fulfilled he debt. Alex, on the other hand, was just realizing his lack of fighting skills and called after the girl. "Hey, wait!"

"What?" The girl asked, turning, once again, to face him.

"You're pretty good at fighting, right?"

"So what if I am?"

"Could you teach me?"

"What's in it for me?" Claire asked, intrigued.

"What do you want?" Alex asked, not having thought of anyway he could pay her back.

"You're taking blood magic, correct?

"Yeah," Alex answered, not sure where she was going with her line of questioning.

"If you make me a blood magic storage seal, then I will teach you to fight."

Alex though about it, blood magic was very individualized, he was pretty sure he could make a blood magic seal died to himself, but he'd didn't know about what would be involved in order to tailor it for someone else. Upon further thought, he thought he would be able to do it if she worked closely with him.

"I should be able to, but you'll have to work with me on it in order for it to be keyed to you."

"Excellent, I'll meet you tomorrow morning at five o'clock sharp in gym D," With that she was gone.

Alex turned back to the library to start working on the blood magic piece she had requested, unaware of the friendship that he had just begun.


	6. Chapter 6

******Disclaimer:** If you recognise it, it isn't mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

**

* * *

**

Chapter 6: Hope Returned and Responsibility Remembered

The last several weeks had been intense. Alex learned that Claire took things, especially combat, very seriously and was a merciless taskmaster, which, oddly, Alex responded well to. They had spent every morning before classes in the gym, while splitting time on the weekends between training and working on the blood magic seal that Alex had promised her in return. They'd been spending so much time together that they couldn't help but learn a bit about the other.

Alex, himself, learned more about vampire society from her than in his magical creatures class. It turns out that there were seven great vampire houses, each modeled after one of the deadly sins. Claire's kiss had been part of a minor clan of the wrath house, but the main clan had wiped most of them out in order to bring them back into the fold, but the two sects had different ideologies that caused a lot of friction between them. Turns out that the two vampires that he had killed were part of the main clan, which explained why Claire hadn't fought back.

On the subject of Claire herself, Alex learned that she was originally from Oregon in the U.S. before her clan was taken over and had been forced to move to Egypt. Most of her kiss, which was sort of like the vampire equivalent of a family, had attended Skölm and there was a lot of pressure on her to distinguish herself here. She wanted to mainly study dueling, but was also interested in potions.

His time with her had been well spent and Alex thought he was finally ready to confront the man who had stolen his things, among which was Hedwig's body. So, this day found him waiting anxiously for classes to end so that he could run to one of the formal dueling rooms that the school maintained for situations like these. Alex had issued his challenge the day before after the blood magic course that the two had together and it would have shown a great deal of weakness if the boy had refused, not that the he seemed at all worried.

As far as Alex could tell, Blake Jenkins had stolen his things out of spite of the fact that Alex was doing so well in blood magic despite the fact that he was new and human (the later the boy seemed to find personally insulting). Alex knew that the boy, as a were-bear, had an advantage in physical prowess, but Alex had been sparing against a vampire and was hoping that he had a magical advantage.

Not that anyone could tell, the school being under water and all, it was a fine warm day in mid October and as Alex prepared in the dueling room as he waited, he was pumped. Rage was barely concealed within his eyes as he thought of the anguish he had felt when he had lost Hedwig, it was obvious that there would be no mercy in this fight.

At long last, Blake arrived, striding confidently down to the dueling floor. Others streamed in after him, including Claire, and took seats in some bleachers that were shielded from the stray magic that was sure to fly about. One interesting thing that Alex had learned was that there were a lot of students interested in him, especially since his defeat of the two vampires. He was a relative unknown and people wanted to know where he stood.

The terms were simple, weapons and magic were allowed but no transforming, and the winner got Alex's things. Alex eyed his opponent across from him as he checked the knife at his belt and gave his staff a few experimental swings. Alex had found that the quarterstaff was his preferred weapon, he thought it was versatile (it also didn't hurt that there was no chance of him hacking his own limbs off while learning to wield it). One of the watching students gave a signal and the fight began.

Blake immediately closed with Alex in an attempt to keep the fight physical and threw a punch at his head that would have knocked Alex out if he hadn't dodged. Alex parried the follow up kick to his solar plexus and countered with a swipe at Blake's knee which was deftly blocked. Alex jumped back and threw a jelly legs hex, but that was dodged and in the next encounter Alex lost his staff.

Alex found it difficult to hold both a wand and a staff anyway, and he made a mental note to learn how to do staff magic. Alex didn't have enough time to think much, however, as Blake was quickly on him again, Alex ducked under the kick and rolled to the side while shooting a stinging hex at the boy's groin, but it went wide and Alex received a hard kick in the side for his trouble. The strike was strong enough to pick Alex up and throw him across the room.

Alex stood up slowly, but he was sure that he had at least one broken rib and the pain was immense, but it wasn't like the pain from being bitten by a basilisk. Alex took the opportunity that the distance between him and his opponent provided to begin a magical joust.

Alex wasn't pulling any punches, and his knowledge of spells had risen exponentially since he had arrived. He threw a blasting hex at Blake but it was shielded and the boy countered with a bone breaker that caught Alex in the right shin. Alex fell to one knee, but managed to hit his opponent with a disarming curse.

Blake, however, seemed unfazed by the loss of his wand as he charged at Alex's prone figure, dodging Alex's various spells as he went. As he went to throw a final blow to Alex's face, however, he was greeted instead by a knife through the arm. Blake staggered back slightly and Alex drew the knife back out, eliciting another yelp of pain. Alex quickly hit the boy with a full body bind and crawled over to where he lay, motionless.

"You will live to regret stealing from me, Blake Jenkins, mark my words," Alex spit at the boy before going to work with his plan of action. Alex deftly castrated the boy, burning the remains so that they could not be but back, and gouged out his left eye, before standing slowly and hoping on his good leg out of the room. If Blake didn't bleed to death, and Alex hoped he didn't, he would be in a world of pain for a long time. Whoever said that there were fates worse than death had been right.

Claire caught up to him as he was making his way back to his room, "Excellent job back there, glad my training served you well, but you really need to work on your staff technique, you lost it way to early in the fight."

"I was thinking the same thing actually. Hey, do you know how to fix a broken bone?" Claire did, and he was fixed up and on his way within a mater of minutes.

The next day one of Blake's friends delivered Alex's things back to him, but couldn't resist a passing barb, "Who wants a dead bird anyway?" He received a knee to the groin for his trouble.

While creating the storage seal for Claire, Alex had found the idea to be really good one and had made one for himself as well. Basically the user could store an item in a separate pocket dimension and could only be retrieved by the user. Alex had inscribed one into his closet and that was where he stored his trunk now. The seal wasn't the only new addition to the room, however.

Alex had applied his locking and security blood enchantments to both the door and the sliding glass door, which also got an unbreakable charm. He had found a ward that would warn him if anyone but him did get in. He attempted to figure out a way to make the barrier that separated his balcony from the ocean more secure but he still didn't know enough about the spell to start messing with it. For now, he thought, it was enough, and he was confident that none of his things could be stolen even if someone did break in.

An interesting fact since he had beaten Blake formally was that he suddenly had a standing within the school and he was expected to protect that standing, if not improve it. Blake hadn't been particularly well ranked within their year or within the were-bear community, but Alex found that he had to actively avoid challenges now if he didn't want to fight. He'd only wanted his things back, but it seemed that Alexander Grey was starting to make a name for himself, even if only a few took notice of that fact.

Claire and he continued meeting to practice even now that the terms of their agreement were over and Claire had taken to sitting with him during meals. It seemed that Alex had made his first friend. This realization of friendship made him remember Sirius, and he felt a pang of guilt.

It had been months since he had left Azkaban, but he still hadn't done anything to help his god-father, although he still wasn't sure that he believed the man's story. Anyway, remembering his responsibility, Alex wrote a quick note explaining who he was and Sirius' story and sent it off to the last of his father's friends: Remus Lupin.

Alex had used one of the schools owls (though how they got to the surface without drowning baffled Alex) and on his way back to his room he was intercepted by a student with a summons from the school's doctor, Professor Soveless Xiloscient.

The hospital wing was located on the fifth floor of the north wing and reminded Alex strongly of how much he hated hospitals. The room was set up more for research than for having patients (which made sense since students did their own healing) with banks of test tubes, microscopes, and equipment that Alex thought would look more at home in a torture chamber than a hospital.

Professor Xiloscient was a tall elf, her long silvery hair was tied up in a bun out of her face and she wore white robes that clung tightly to her frame that had a lot of pockets. The woman wore a severe expression laced with excitement when she cast her gaze on Alex.

"Ah, Mr. Grey, I've been expecting you."

"Err, why did you wish to see me professor?" Alex had been confused by the summon, he didn't have any classes with her and it was generally accepted that the teachers left the students to their own devices, which left only one possibility.

"It has come to my attention that your blood holds strange properties. Do I presume correctly when I say that you knew of this before your coming here?"

"Yes professor."

"And am I also correct in saying that you know at least some of the reason for this and its properties?"

"Yes."

"Excellent, we have a place to start then."

"What do you mean?"  
"Well on my study of it, of course," The elf stated as if it was obvious that he was going to allow it. Unfortunately for her, Claire had been rubbing of on him.

"What's in it for me?"

Professor Xiloscient looked shocked for just a moment before grinning, "Intelligent of you not to just consent. Very well, for as long as you allow me to study your condition, I shall tutor you in healing charms."

Alex agreed and began to fill in the professor about his changing genetics, and if possible her excitement increased. She had just thought that his blood had some strange natural properties, but the chance to study as a human's genetics slowly blended with two highly magical creatures, that was something else entirely.

Alex quickly found, however, that he had gotten the short end of the deal. Sure, the healing charms would be very useful, but the professor, he learned, was borderline sadistic and took pleasure in forcing Alex to do the most ridiculous tests, like studying his cranial fluid. He could not, however, argue with the results. There had been no more changes as of yet, but the professor had a reasonable idea of the type of thing that he could expect.

She hypothesized that he would start developing a resistance to magic and that his skin would become resistant to physical attacks (she thought this might happen through growing scales, however). She was unsure if any of the creature's natural magics would manifest in Alex, though he was hoping to be able to fire travel like a phoenix. Everything else was mostly unclear, but she was confident that the other changes would become evident as his genetic settled.

Two points, however, that the professor had brought up deeply worried Alex. There was a possibility that since both a basilisk and a phoenix were immortal that he might be as well (he was unsure how he felt about this, but Claire, as a vampire and immortal herself, thought that it would fabulous). Also, and the more distressing issue, it was very likely that his genetics were no longer compatible with that of humans and he would be unable to procreate. Having kids had never been something that Alex had thought much about, but he didn't like the idea of the possibility being taken from him.


	7. Chapter 7

******Disclaimer:** If you recognise it, it isn't mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

* * *

Salvation in the Devil's Triangle

**Chapter 7: Of Course it's Halloween**

The morning of Halloween dawned bright, though the event went unnoticed by the underwater inhabitants of the Skölm Institute of Magic. Alexander Grey rose apprehensively from his bed; he didn't have a good track record with Halloweens. His parents had died on Halloween, and for the past few years his life had been threatened on this particular day. Idly, he wondered if his luck would continue.

Alex dressed and made his way down to his practice session with Claire. The two had continued to bond while kicking the shit out of each other (though, Alex admitted, Claire did most of the ass kicking). His extra sessions with Claire had, additionally, helped him a lot in his defense class and he was no longer in danger of needing to repeat the course.

After they had showered, they made their way down to breakfast and to Alex's first surprise of the day: a reply from Remus.

Dear Harry,

I was very surprised to receive your letter, and even more surprised at the contents. I must say there was quite a fuss when you didn't return to Hogwarts this year and even more so when your whereabouts couldn't be found. I must say that I am quite relieved to hear that you are doing well, even if I don't know where you are. Rest assured, however, that I won't press you for information as I understand if you don't trust me yet.

About Sirius… I am unsure whether to believe his story or not, and I can tell by the wording in your letter that you also have your doubts, but I have looked into the matter. As a matter of fact, I am teaching at Hogwarts this year as the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher so it was a simple matter to check up on the rat in question, unfortunately he seems to have gone missing. Sorry I couldn't give you better news.

Sincerely,

Remus Lupin

Alex was a bit bummed that the rat had gotten away, but the news was quickly sent to the back of his mind by the events of the day.

Claire had invited him to a party that was going on that evening and though he was apprehensive to be around so many people he didn't know, especially vampires, he didn't have a good enough excuse to get out of it, and it would afford him the opportunity to leave the school for the first time since arriving. Anxiousness aside, he was rather looking forward to an up close look at vampire culture. Claire claimed it would be boring and that she wanted to bring him since with his luck something interesting would happen. She would probably regret her words.

The school had the day off, the reason for this was that Halloween was a magically powerful day and much of the students and staff had been waiting for this day in order to perform certain magics. Alex himself had decided to try his first attempt at blood enchanting a living being. Ok, it was a plant but it's still alive and it made the magics complicated enough not having to factor in consciousness.

The point of the enchantment was to make the plant hostile against anyone but himself. In the future he hoped to use the enchantment on any plants he might grow so as they could protect themselves from theft, this first attempt, however, was on a simple vine trellis that he had bought from the herbology professor and Alex planned on having it grow along his balcony as part of his defense system.

Alex was tempted to get Claire to test his new vine protection, but decided that neither of the two outcomes would work in his favor. Either she would end up destroying the vines rendering them useless or she would be caught in his trap and take it out on him after he had set her free. In the end, he decided to just hope that it worked satisfactorily.

Alex's first attempt to get out of Claire's party had been that he had nothing to wear, but she had quickly decided that a shopping trip was needed, so that afternoon the pair swam to the surface and took a port-key to the magical district in New York, New York.

Alex quickly found out (after he had fallen on his face when they appeared by port-key and Claire got a laugh in at his expense) that Americans never did anything half assed, if they did it they did it bigger and better than ever before, though mainly bigger. The magical district looked much like the rest of the great muggle city with its great big skyscrapers and swarms of people. Fortunately, there weren't any cars so they didn't have to worry about getting run over.

Claire quickly led him into one of the huge buildings and he found himself in the largest department store he had ever seen (he later learned that the building was really only half the store, the other half being the skyscraper across the street). Alex also decided that he much preferred American fashion to British. Americans had been inspired by their muggle counterparts and though they still wore robes they seemed more functional and less gaudy.

Alex ended up liking what he found that he very nearly replaced his current wardrobe, as it was he bought several outfits. His new robes were back with little bits of red on some and a deep green on others. The main robe was more coat-like than normal so that it was tight about the torso and sleeves but billowed out at the waist to show the pants, Alex thought they gave him a slightly intimidating visage, especially with his hair and eyes, Claire agreed.

Alex stayed in one of his new outfits and had one of the shop employees shrink the rest of his purchases and then put those along with his original clothes in one of his pockets. The pair then left and Claire pulled out another port-key that would take them to the party which was to take place at some estate in New Zealand.

Alex was very glad, when he once again landed on his face, that there was only one other person around besides Claire to see it. The vampire who was responsible for greeting those that arrived by port-key smirked at the pair before welcoming them and showing them the path up to the estate.

The party was being hosted by the head family, the Gröthmers, of the vampire house of envy. The family was obviously wealthy and seemed to like to flaunt it. The mansion of the estate was done in a Victorian style in soft white and blue and from what he could see had immense gardens.

The entrance hall was done out with gold filigree as was the grand staircase that led to the upper floors. They were met at the door by another vampire and shown to the main ballroom, where the party had already begun, though maybe party wasn't the right word. Party implied fun, Claire had been right, this would be boring.

The party itself seemed to be a chance for the various clans of the various houses to do some political posturing and tensions were high. On a bright note, Alex was able to meet Claire's maker, Elizabella Anippe. Interesting fact about vampires: only some of them could make other vampires, these were called makers, also if a child was changed into a vampire during its first month alive it would age normally for a few decades before stopping, after one month and their age and development would be halted. Anyway, Elizabella seemed very kind and even invited Alex to go on vacation with their kiss over the winter holiday, Alex quickly accepted.

Later Claire would tell him that her maker wasn't usually that nice and that she had been the one who had made sure that Claire could fight. Alex was slightly intimidated by the woman after that.

The party dragged on lazily and Alex was starting to wonder if he would in fact be able to avoid his disastrous luck this year, but then he met Aidan Gröthmer, heir apparent to the Gröthmer family. Aidan was the type of vampire that looked down on all of the other races, especially mortals, and couldn't help but flaunt his superiority over Alex.

"I don't know what I would do if I were a lowly mortal, I might have to kill myself for being so pathetic."

"The world would be better off," Alex responded, but the vampire misunderstood his meaning.

"My thoughts exactly, the world would be much better off if all the mortals went and offed themselves."

"You misunderstand," Alex said, "I meant that the world could do without the likes of you." That certainly got his attention, along with a few of the vampires around.

"Excuse you, let me remind you that I am the heir to the Gröthmer family, and you are nothing but a lowly mortal, it would be like squashing a bug to kill you right now," The boy said, haughtily

"I think you'll find that this _bug,_ as you say, has a trick or two up his sleeve that you would be hard put to contend with."

"Is that a challenge?" The vampire asked, his voice dripping with arrogance.

_What the fuck_, Alex though, this _party was getting boring, might as well_, "That's right." That certainly got the attention of most of the vampires in attendance. A lone mortal was going to fight one of the heirs on his home ground no less.

Alex was led down to a dungeon that the family used for sparing and began stretching and wishing he could find a way to conveniently carry has staff. As it was, Alex had one knife that he'd strapped to his lower back which he drew with his left hand and swung experimentally. Alex drew his wand with his right hand and took his place on the floor.

Aidan stood across from him with a massive broad sword that would have obviously been too heavy for him if he wasn't a vampire. As it was, Alex wasn't sure if the weapon was actually useful or just meant to intimidate him, with Aidan it could go either way.

One of the spectator vampires gave the starting signal and Alex quickly found that Aidan was actually proficient with his strange weapon, but that the long, wide strikes were rather easy to dodge, but made it rather hard to get a hit in; it was also capable of blocking magical attacks. This revelation made Alex come to the conclusion that he was going to try something a bit reckless.

Alex saw the strike coming, but didn't move to dodge, this time he brought up his seemingly puny knife and put all of his strength into a block, he was nearly thrown to the ground but he succeed in stopping the blade, and that gave him enough time to hit Aidan with a bone breaker in the left arm, which meant that the boy would be unable to use the blade. The block, however, had completely worn him out and despite his broken arm Aidan continued to dominate the fight.

Alex was finally able to get enough distance between them to change the fight into the realm of magic and shot of a bludgeoning hex, which was shielded. He sent another bone breaker which was dodged, but the follow up stunner hit its mark, unfortunately vampires had some resistance to magic and it would take more than one to actually bring the boy down, he was a bit lethargic in his movements now though.

Aidan attempted to counter with a banishing hex but he failed to get it off before his right arm was hit with another bone breaker and he dropped his wand.

"Do you yield?" Alex asked, knowing that the boy wouldn't.

"I would never…" Before the boy could finish Alex hit his legs with bone breakers and he fell to his knees, "It's just a flesh wound, I can still bite your bloody knees off you yellow bellied bastard." Alex, however, had, had enough and hit him with enough stunners to knock him out.

The rest of the party was a lot more interesting for Alex as he seemed to both gain and loose popularity. All of the vampires who thought the same way Aidan had now hated him, but everyone else was glad that someone had finally put the pompous ass in his place.


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: **If you recognise it, it isn't mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

* * *

**Salvation in the Devil's Triangle**

**Chapter 8: Guardians of Light**

It seemed that ever since Halloween and Alex's defeat of Aidan Gröthmer, the heir to the main kiss of the vampire house of envy, that he was awash with vampire politics. Every vampire in the school, it seemed, either wanted to fight him or turn him into a vampire. Alex was pretty sure the latter was impossible as the process involved a vampire drinking his blood, which would, of course, kill the vamp before the change could be made.

Alex ignored the vampires mostly, and with Claire's help avoided most of the fights, and won the rest. Of course, this was rather problematic. He hadn't been challenged by anyone with any kind of real power yet but he knew it was only a matter of time. In the mean time he could use the combat experience, Alex had found that he was a kinesthetic learner, he learned best by doing, so the more he got to actually fight, the better he got at it.

Of course, to most of the school he was still just a bookworm who had gotten into a scuffle with the vampires. He didn't mind though, his time as Harry Potter had taught him that he didn't like being noticed all that much.

Finals were approaching and Alex lost most of his free study time under the necessary review that he needed. A few of his classes had given out projects instead of having a test at the end, including blood magic. Professor Nydel had tasked them to create a blood magic enchantment of any purpose but had to be able to be keyed to other users besides the maker's, have a consequence for those that weren't keyed in but tried to use it anyway, and had to bestow some sort of ability to the enchanted object. Alex was determined to create something that would prove to the professor that he would be able to succeed if he were allowed to skip a level or two the next semester.

Alex had run through various ideas before settling on enchanting a sea serpent. Living beings, especially those with brains, were very difficult to work blood magic on, add that to the other required enchantments and Alex had delegated himself what should have been beyond him, but he was confident in his abilities. The difficulty was a lot of the reason that he had chosen to work with a snake, that way he could communicate with it, and knowing the subject made it a lot easier to work blood magic.

For the enchantments, Alex decided that to key someone into it he would set it up so that the serpent just had to ingest the subject's blood, for a security measure anyone who wasn't keyed in would be shocked enough to knock them out for a minute or two, he also decided to give it the ability to breathe air instead of only through its gills. The last was the hardest part, but it actually would make the whole project easier, as he would only have to do the first enchantment underwater, then the snake would be able to come inside and Alex would be able to do the rest.

Finding a sea serpent ended up not being half as difficult as Alex had thought it was going to be as the beasts were abundant in the water surrounding the school and Alex, under a bubble head charm had been able to talk one into being his lab rat. The serpent didn't have a name pronounceable in English so Alex decided to call him Frank.

The hardest part ended up just figuring out how to enchant Frank to breathe normal air. In the end, Alex settled on a series of seals that modified his gills to breathe only normal air, but would be able to magically convert water into air. They tried a few test runs in both environments and they seemed to work fine. The next trick part was to rig the security system so that it would only go off for humanoids, that is things that weren't animals because Alex wanted to be able to release Frank after the project was over and not make him have to worry about accidentally harming the other water creatures. Alex was somehow able to talk Claire into testing the keying system and that seemed to work as well.

The day the projects were due was a day of pride for Alex as he wowed the rest of the class with Frank's show of abilities. No one else had even attempted to enchant something that was living. Professor Nydel only gave a quiet smirk at his presentation, but that was enough for Alex. Of course, the end of the project also meant that he would have to say goodbye to Frank. Alex almost teared at the snake's departure, but both had promised to visit, and Frank was eager to show his family his new tricks.

In preparation for their trip to Brazil over winter break, Alex and Claire had been studying the patronus charm just in case they ran into lethifolds. It was probably the hardest piece of magic that either had ever attempted, and both had trouble finding a memory that was powerful enough to fuel a corporal patronus, however seeing the beings of pure positive energy leap into being out of their wands had been worth it.

Alex had a real hard time finding the right memory. His childhood with the Dursley's was out, and he didn't remember anything from the brief time he had spent with his parents. His Hogwarts days were tainted by his departure, and while he had enjoyed himself immensely at his new school, it wasn't exactly what you would call a joyful environment. That didn't exactly give him much to work with, actually it left him nothing to work with, and so it was nothing that he used. He made up a memory.

Making up a memory is a lot harder than it sounds, Alex had to create a situation that filled him with pure happiness and he didn't have a lot to draw from. Finally, he decided to summon the image of him resurrecting Hedwig, and how happy he would be once she was with him again. Afterwards, Alex would hypothesize that what ever memory you used when you first summoned a corporal patronus decided its form, in his case it was a shining white owl. Of course, Claire's cockroach certainly made him curious as to what she had been thinking about. She, naturally, wasn't telling.

Alex had continued writing back and forth with Remus, but there hadn't been any progress made. Neither could really do anything as long as the rat remained missing, and neither came up with a way to locate him that succeeded. Both were left slightly depressed about the whole situation, but without a course of action they were stuck. Perhaps winter break would clear their minds and an idea would pop into their heads.

At long last, school let out for the holidays and Alex and Claire found themselves back on surface and port-keying to a new location. Both unaware of what surprises were in store for them, of course one always had to account for the "Grey" factor, as Claire had taken to calling it. With Alex around there was no way things could be boring.

* * *

**A/n: **Some people have noticed some similarities between this story and Miranda Flairgold's A Second Chance at Life series and I would just like to say that I realize that some things probably seem the same but that I am making every possible effort to make this story my own and I hope that becomes clear as this story goes on. Anyways, thanks for reading and I hope you continue to do so.


	9. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: **Anthing you recognise isn't mine, anything you don't, well that might not be mine either.

* * *

**Salvation in the Devil's Triangle**

Chapter 9: Bungle in the Jungle

Alexander Grey had known for some time that he was going through puberty, the affects of the hormones coursing through his body had been made clear to him on many an occasion, but never to the extent of this. The vampires of the house of lust seemed to delight in tormenting him as he attempted to survive their eternal party.

Alex had arrived with Claire and her kiss in Brazil three days before and would need to survive another seven if he hoped to return to school for the spring term. At first, Claire had been amused at Alex's troubles, but soon took pity upon him and arranged for the two of them to see some of the ruins that littered the local area.

Alex had never been much interested in history, but his joy at getting away from the overly affectionate vampires was enough to get him interested in anything, and so he found himself enjoying the ancient temples and the stories they seemed to contain. Alex found himself wondering what kind of life the original inhabitants must have lived, if it was anything like his own, if they had magic.

Alex and Claire explored many of the ruins, but when darkness came creeping the pair started their return, however, unknown to either, the "Grey" factor had decided to kick in and there was a nasty surprise waiting for them around a blind corner in the path they were taking home.

Before Alex knew what was happening a man was on top of him, tackling him to the ground. Alex quickly rolled the both of them over and freed himself from man only to be tackled by another as he tried to regain his feet. As he fell, Alex grabbed for the knife at his back and cursed the restriction on underage magic. The man who had tackled him almost got him in a lock when Alex lurched with his knife and caught his attacker in the abdomen.

Alex's next attempt to get to his feet was successful and he took a moment to assess the situation. Claire was holding her own against three of her own aggressors, but Alex could tell that the still setting sun was draining her of her energy, not to mention that she had been in the sun for the whole day already.

Vampires did not burst into flames when caught in the sunlight, rather it was much like kryptonite was to superman, it weakened them and prevented the use of any of their powers. Because of this, Alex was sure that it was only of matter of time before she succumbed to the attacks.

Alex was soon interrupted from his thoughts as his own two attackers gathered themselves for their next attack. Alex readied himself for their attack, even knowing he would lose, worrying only about what would happen to the pair afterwards, what did these strange men want with them?

Alex quickly lost his knife, and under the pressure of his attackers found himself face first in the dirt while they tied his hands behind his back. His last thought before they knocked him out was that he really should have figured that he couldn't just have a nice vacation without something like this happening, fate really seemed to have it in for him.

When he awoke it was to find himself and the already awake Claire in the back of some kind of wagon heading to unknown places.

"What do we know?" Alex asked, wondering if Claire's keen hearing had found anything out.

"We were captured by muggle slavers and are being taken to auction," She replied in the emotionless voice that Alex knew she used to hide her emotions, "We were out for the whole night and it is now sometime midmorning, I think."

That would explain why they were still tied up, Alex supposed. The diffused sunlight that seeped through the thin canvas of the wagon's covering was enough to weaken Claire to the point that she didn't have the strength to break her bonds. Alex once again cursed on the underage magic restrictions, true they were allowed to defend themselves with magic, but the pair hadn't thought they would be in danger and had left their wands behind; they would never make such a mistake again, assuming they lived through their present predicament.

"You know," Alex exclaimed, a slight smirk finding the way to his face, "this is the sort of situation that I wish I was a masochist, as it is the rope they used is definitely going to leave its mark on my wrists."

Claire wore a smirk of her own as she replied, "I know what you mean, of course all I need is a bit of blood and I'll be good as new."

"I suppose this is one of the times when having poisonous blood is a bad thing, if I were normal you could get enough strength from my blood to get us out of here."

"True," she said, smirk leaving her face, "Anyways, I recon it should be easier to escape after we are sold. Of course, neither of us know the area or where the nearest magical community is, so we'll just have to wing it."

Alex knew she was right. If they ever got out of this mess Alex vowed he would learn some magic that didn't require the use of a wand, aparating would also have been a useful skill to know at that moment. Oh well, he thought, guess I'll have to do what I always do and wing it.

The pair past the rest of the journey mostly in silence, with a few attempts at humor thrown in, both knew that their predicament was their own fault and could have been easily avoided. Sometime later the wagon stopped for a time and there was a lot of talking going on outside.

One of their attackers from the previous night came and grabbed the pair of them, putting them in line with a number of other newly acquired slaves. They spent the rest of the afternoon kneeling in the mud as various strangers came by to inspect the goods, some were bought, but not Alex and Claire, at least not until a strange hooded figure came by.

The person was completely concealed to such an extent that Alex couldn't even tell if it was a man or woman. The figure had a quick whispered conversation with the man who seemed to be the leader and then the pair found themselves being led away by the figure. At least they were together, the pair thought.

The figure led them through the back ally market and into the outskirts of town and down a dark alleyway before turning around and lowering their hood to reveal that it was in fact someone they were familiar with, Oskar Nydel, Skölm's blood magic professor.

"Professor!" Alex exclaimed, "What are you doing here?"

"I could ask the same of you, but I think that we all know not to pry into other business."

"I apologize, of course, professor."

"Anyway I couldn't leave my most promising student to be sold away; of course I'm sure that the both of you will answer if ever I call for your aid."

Alex and Claire both nodded, knowing that the professor's message was clear: they both owed him, big time. Neither was willing to contemplate the type of favor the professor might call them in for though.

The Yuan-ti side-alonged them back to the Manor they were staying at and left before being dragged into the lust vampires' notorious domain. Upon entering themselves they were assaulted by Claire's maker, who upon hearing their tale began to berate them before locking them up in their rooms and promising that the training they, especially Claire, would endure for the rest of the vacation would not be pleasant.

Indeed, every waking moment that the pair had for the rest of break was spent in a dojo with Elizabella and Alex quickly learned why Claire had believed that she was going easy on him in their own training.

A few days in and Alex could hardly think past the soreness his body felt, and still he was expected to improve. He was immensely glad that he would be skipping ahead in blood magic next term, which would mean that he would begin to start on self enhancement rituals. If he was going to continue to live in a world where he was expected to compete with vampires and other non-humans than he would need an edge, and edge he hoped blood magic would give him. Of course, maybe his genetics would settle and he'll develop a power that evens the odds even more, he could only hope.

When the pair returned to Skölm it was with a renewed vigor that they threw themselves into their studies determined to never put themselves in a situation where they would be so helpless ever again.


	10. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer: **If you recognise it, it's not mine, if you don't, well that might not be mine either.

* * *

**Salvation in the Devil's Triangle**

**Chapter 10: Hooray for Grudges**

Alex was quick to fall back into the routine of school and he was glad that news of his escapades over the break hadn't seemed to have made it to the ears of the students. It would have been embarrassing, not to mention the blow to his developing reputation.

Classes had begun again and Alex was pleased that he was no longer behind, even in arithmacy, runes, and blood magic, the classes which he had been allowed to skip levels in, he found he was still on track. Charms and transfiguration as usual he was on track with, while continuing to be much better at the practical than the theoretical. Alex had decided to switch to magical defense instead of non magical for the term, much to Claire's disappointment, though their sessions continued so it wasn't as though he was going to get out of fighting shape.

Alex continued to have to deal with the grudge that the Gröthemer family had against him, it seemed as though he would have to beat them all into submission if he was going to get any rest. He just waited for the day when he would be bested by one of the older vampires who had yet to pay him any head and he would pay the consequences, hopefully he would live through the experience.

To that end, Alex was once again studying ahead in his favorite subject: blood magic and he was working on his first ritual. This one was the first of a series of seven that would increase his stamina, he was also planning one for increased strength, and one for speed; however he was having trouble due to the fact that his blood had yet to settle due to his changing genetics. Because of this he had to weave a much more flexible design to his runes that would normally not be necessary, but that would hopefully make sure that his blood magic would stay bonded to him no matter what changes his genetics put him through.

His sessions with Professor Xiloscient had continued and Alex was beginning to feel as though he hadn't gotten the short end of the stick as much as he had previously believed. Since they were done with preliminary testing all that was left to do was to continue to monitor his condition, and while he still had to endure some rather uncomfortable tests it was not as bad as before and they were able to spend more teaching him healing charms which he already knew would be immensely useful in the future, he couldn't do much beyond healing simple fractures, bruises and the like, but it was a start.

As much as he had felt like a loner bookworm at the beginning of his first term, that feeling had completely left. He still spent the majority of his time studying, but the knowledge that he had even just one good friend in his new world was enough. Claire could be abrasive at times, and had a tendancy to get distant when emotional, but he had his down falls as well and he knew that they grew closer with each passing day. He began to wonder if he would begin to collect near death experiences here that would allow him to bond closer to his friends as he did before. Maybe it would work out better this time than it had before.

On the subject of friends, he hadn't made any more, but he had found himself a rival. Darius Gälanodyl was at the top of his blood magic class before Alex had arrived and was determined to keep that title, as determined as Alex was to take it from him. The young elf was extremely knowledgeable and talented and had a gift with blending nature magic into his rituals that Alex found inspiring. Alex knew next to nothing about nature magicks, but Darius, as an elf, had been taught them from a young age and could now manipulate his element: earth to do most anything he could think of and was developing blood magic to further develop his abilities, Alex found himself rather envious, but didn't know where to start or who to ask about learning even what his element was. Because of this Alex set himself to work even harder and prove his flexibility and creativity with blood magic.

To this end Alex had decided that in addition to the stamina, strength, and speed rituals (which were rather basic, but still necessary if he wanted to compete with vampires and others with increased physical abilities, such as elves), he would also begin to design a ritual that would prove his superiority not just to the professor and Darius, but to himself. He had begun to take great pride in his prowess in blood magic and he didn't want to lose the feeling.

Alex spent many hours in the library researching until he finally discovered the perfect ritual, or rather the idea for the perfect ritual, as far as he knew no one had ever attempted something like it, though the theory had been previously established. Probably, no one else had felt they had such a need, but Alex's recent experiences had caused him to be much more wary of the weakness of needing a wand. And so Alexander Grey designed a ritual to bond his wand to him.

While seemingly simple, the magicks involved were quite complicated. Alex wanted to be able to call his wand to his hand from any distance, which meant the wand would have to be teleported somehow. While this effect could be achieved through many means, some could be blocked by various wards and such, so Alex chose to tie his magic to the magic of the wand. In essence what he was doing was changing his wand into pure magic and forcing that magic to become a part of his own. If the ritual worked as it was supposed to then Alex would be able to manifest or banish his wand on a whim, though there were a few magicks that would still be able to stop it they were very few.

Alex became rather obsessed with his projects, so much so that he forgot what blood magic rituals contained. If wouldn't be inanimate object or plants or animals that his knives would be carving the runes into, it was his skin. As much as he was aware of how the rune arrays had to be placed at certain parts of the body, how utility, pressure points, and the like played a point he forgot about the pain. The pain and the risk of death. One wrong rune in a ritual and you could die in some of the worst ways possible, or worse live with the worst of consequences. Alex forgot about these things until the night of his first ritual when it all hit home.

Alex need not have worried, his preparations had been perfect, his design suited his magic well and the chamber the school maintained for these sorts of things had been well chosen. Everything from the location to the design to the position he sat in to the time of year affected the ritual in one way or another and Alex had been tireless in his research to find the exact ones for his rituals. Alex downed the strongest pain relief potion he could without its magic adversely affecting the ritual and hoped for the best.

Alex would spend the entire rest of the term designing and performing the four rituals he set out for himself, and even Darius would admit the prowess he would show in his wand binding ritual, but for now he had more immediate concerns.

Velocity Gröthemer was the head of the vampires from the house of envy that resided a Skölm and a sixth year. The constant fights between her house and Alex had begun to annoy her as she believed that they were waiting their time with a puny human like him, even if he was beating them. So it was early march that Alex received and official challenge from her.

Alex had expected the challenge, but that didn't make him ready to face it, but there was no way to turn it down, the vampires would find it insulting and assault him without issuing a challenge or fighting fair, so he accepted.

The terms were simple, which Alex liked, all powers and weapons were allowed, if he won, the envy vamps at the school would leave him alone, if he lost he would go through Nessie. Nessie was one of the guardians of the school and few students had survived the task of stealing one of her eggs, though it was still one of the pastimes of the school.

Alex walked into the dueling chamber staff in hand and wand tucked away in his magic. Ever since performing the ritual, Alex had, had a much easier time with staff combat as he didn't need to hold onto his wand at the same time.

Velocity was already waiting for him, a smirk on her face. She was taller than Alex, her long blond hair was up in a bun to keep out of the way and her sharp, green eyes didn't leave Alex from the moment he entered the room.

The pair stood opposite one another ten paces apart and made ready. Alex stretched a bit before holding his staff diagonally from himself in a position that Claire's maker: Elizabella had shown him and waited for the signal to begin. One of the spectators rose and gave the starting signal and Alex watched as Velocity launched herself at him almost faster than he could see. He wondered for a moment if there was a ritual to increase the speed at which his mind interpreted his sight and he parried he barehanded bow with his staff.

Velocity made up for her failed initial attack by landing a blow to Alex's solar plexus and sending him across the room. Alex broke the fall with a roll and was soon back on his feet. He called his wand to his hand and sent a stunner and a bone breaker at his opponent, both were dodged and Alex quickly banished his wand again when the fight once again became close quartered and he had his work cut out for him blocking the elder vampire's strikes.

Alex made another attempt to take the fight into the magical realm only for the envy vamp to pull out her own wand and send a stunner his way, he shielded and sent a jelly legs hex and a stunner of his own, however the second incantation didn't leave him with enough time shield against her volley of bone breakers. Alex tried to dodge, but was unsuccessful, and caught one each in his left leg and arm. It took but a moment for Velocity to rush over and deliver the finishing blow to his temple.

A half hour later he woke up to a throbbing headache and the familiar sight of Claire helping him to his feet. She had already fixed his bones and bruises and the two quickly began a discussion of the fight.

"I thought it went rather well considering the circumstances, maybe you should try to tie your staff to you as you did your wand," Claire commented as they walked back to the dorms.

"Maybe, but that would only work if I had a magical staff, on the other hand I have been meaning to learn staff magic anyways," Alex mused, "Anyways, I'm off to bed, I have a giant sea monster to steal an egg from and I want as much time to prepare as possible and I don't see Velocity giving me much time to study."

Alex was correct; the next day he received notice that the challenge was to be completed that weekend, so he set in to do as much research as possible before he had to swim out into the unknown.


End file.
